Arkansas?

On November 11th of this year, Alice Walton of the Walmart family fortune will open the doors of her dream child, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. The multi-million dollar investment will house some of America's most valuable artworks from the likes of John Singer Sargent, Jasper Johns, and Norman Rockwell (see his iconic Rosie the Riveter below) in a collection of about 600 canvases. It will, no doubt, be a formidable and significant museum based upon this early press alone, even before Walton has released information about the other 90% of the museum's holdings. Naturally, a museum of this stature will be located in heart of American arts culture - Bentonville, Arkansas.

Huh? If you've never heard of Bentonville, it's located in northwest Arkansas near the slightly larger township of Fayetteville, both of which are about three hours from Little Rock. Bentonville's previous (and only other) claim to fame is as the hometown of the original Walmart, hence Alice Walton's affinity for the locale. Unfortunately for her, very few members of the art world share Walton's affection for the small-town setting. Since announcing her plan in the early 2000s, the East Coast has balked at the idea of relinquishing canvases destined for Crystal Bridges. The establishment seems to believe that selling art to Walton and her museum is like sentencing the American masterworks to a slow death in a mid-Southern oblivion. They parallel this museum with the same criticisms which have been leveled at Walmart, as if large, laboriously gathered art collections are in any way related to depreciation related to mass production. One particularly sour critic, Rebecca Mead of the New Yorker calls Crystal Bridges "Wal-Art." Evidently, entrenched detractors find it offensive that the heartland dares claim a stake in Americana which is as much a part of the East Coast as it is part of the rolling central plains.

The New York Times at least takes a kinder approach by pointing out that the museum will be located in an unexpected location, but then dedicates the rest of its article to explaining Walton's intentions behind her choice. It was primarily this article which convinced me of Walton's sincerity and competence as an art collector. It seems Walton has been interested in art for 25 years, during the last 10 of which she was specifically collecting works with the museum in mind. She has surrounded herself with expert art historians who have also guided her choices and helped shape to museum from a formally educated perspective. And in terms of situating the museum in Bentonville, I think it's a bold and magnanimous move.

The act parallels to me the move that Samuel H. Kress undertook in the 1950s. Though nowadays Kress is largely unknown, he and his low-price, high-volume convenience stores used to be a household name in America. Like Walton and her family, Kress became a millionaire off of his popular market shops and eventually returned the favor to America by donating the artworks he had collected via the nickels and dimes of Kress store patrons. Though Kress's collection of art was largely Italian and he dispersed his works to museums throughout the U.S., I applaud Walton's decision to gather American art and to display it in middle America among the original consumers who made her dream possible. I think New York and the East Coast need to recognize that arts culture can and should exist outside the purview of elites in high-rise lofts. There are drawbacks to any museum in every location, but art can be appreciated anywhere - yes, even in the backwaters of rural Arkansas. It's touching that the objects in Crystal Springs will get to live in a uniquely American setting, and I hope even the city-slickers from back East will be able to make the trip come November to witness the manifestation of an American legacy.


Sources
BigThink.com: http://bigthink.com/ideas/39056
The New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/06/27/110627fa_fact_mead
NYT: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/17/arts/design/alice-walton-on-her-crystal-bridges-museum-of-american-art.html?pagewanted=1&_r=4&ref=arts